Haha. Ive had a crisis of faith. Im not sure where I belong... ;-)

Im totally down. But... my affiliation recently changed. So im not sure what to do about that lmao

Just saw this. Hope things have started looking up. Good luck!

Thanks for the response! I agree with what you're saying about the rules needing to be more simplified. These were rough ideas that would need to be shaped through feedback.

I also want to say at the outset, I never really liked the idea of licensing ships lol. So I understand. I kind of threw that in so I would have something for the mercenaries.

But also, I think my rules were conjured in my mind based on how the server is now. I hope it will grow and more people will join, but at the moment, none of this would be TOO difficult to track because there doesn't seem to be that many people on (at least not when I am on). Obviously as the server grows that would change, and it would become almost impossible to enforce these rules.

I just had a clarification: Do you mean the way the Wolves impound a ship should remain, but they wolves just keep the ship? Or do you mean, essentially do away with that system? Just curious.

I also take your point about the Nomad city ships. I was trying to balance it with speed offsets but realistically the way the game is everyone travels the same speed, it only matters how much of a lead you can get on someone in the beginning it seems. So the city ships might be a bad idea unless they were limited to defensive operations? No attacks launched by bringing the city ships in system?

Again I appreciate the feedback. This is pretty much all I think about while I'm grinding away at work so thats where it all came from. haha.

A graphics overhaul would be nice. Then maybe I could walk into a greenhouse without my game lagging into next week! Lol

So I was bored at work the other day and I thought up some new rules/build permissions that I thought might be cool. Or maybe they're awful. I was told to post them here for feedback so here we go! Hope you don't hate them!

The idea ws to add a more RPG feel, and maybe make the factions a little more diverse so that choosing one was more about what kind of play you wanted to have.

Across all factions and ships you keep the exposed thruster rule. These rules predominantly affect CVs.

Each faction would have its own set of build rules and powers associated with them.

Military/Police - The vanilla rules apply. They have the same rules as now with military and non-military designations. The same aspects of what creates a dropship, carrier, or gunboat. Freighter limits, etc. Essentially, with regards to build permissions, nothing has changed. However, most of the Military/Police powers come into play with how they interact with the pirates.

Pirates - This is perhaps the most drastic - and I think fun - change. Most real life pirates used small nimble ships to avoid detection and make porting in strange places easier. THey also broke the law. Like all the time. Therefore, Pirates have a max ship size, when purchased from Wally's, of size class 3. HOWEVER, once they get the ship from wally, they are pirates after all. They can make any illegal/aftermarket modifications they desire. As long as the thrusters aren't covered, and you don't add any extra length, width, or depth to the ship, you can jam as many turrets on the ship as you want. Put constructors on military ships. Essentially they do not need to conform to really any rule as long as no additional steel is added to increase space for more turrets. If the devices push the ship over size class 3 thats fine, but you can't turn a size class 3 into a size class 10 and then load it with guns.

Now the drawback is, if the Military police catch you, they must allow you one chance to surrender. If you refuse or fail to reply, then you will be attacked. If you do surrender, your ship will be impounded and brought back to the Wolves impound yard. There you will have 3 real life weeks to come and pay a set price of gold to recover it. The price will be determined by the pirate recovering the ship essentially. If they choose to recover it as is, they will pay 15% of its original purchase price. If they choose to have it stripped so that it conforms to server rules, they will only pay 8% of the original price. Once returned you can re-add the guns and illegal mods over again if you wish. If you do not recover it within the allotted time, it will be scheduled for Police Auction, with starting bids at 35% of its original price, with a reserve applied to the pirates of 50%. Ex: A freelancer can bid 35%, but for the pirate to win the bid he must post a bid of 50% or higher, depending on how high the bidding goes. Now if a Freelancer wins the bid, they are allowed to take this ship, but if it is discovered by the Wolves, it is again subject to impound, and the new owner can now come and recover it for the prices mentioned above.
Pirates are allowed 1 large CV per faction. 1 ship that can be as large as they want. This ship must conform to the turret limit + 5 turrets. Also, it can have the maximum artillery turret count +1, which are included in the turret total. This ship is not subject to impoundment, thus it may be attacked on sight by the Military/Police.

Mercenaries - When I think mercenary, I think of a private army. Private armies value privacy, discretion, and skirt the bounds of the law. Therefore, Military/Police cannot search/patrol inside Mercenary space. This is important because: Mercenaries can pay a premium price to wally - an additional 15-25% of the ship value, to obtain CVs with turret counts above the server limit, military vessels with constructors, etc. Essentially they can illegally mod, but the mods must be made by the SHIPWRIGHT, and not by the faction. They cannot add additional turrets above the limit once purchased, and when building the ships, cannot add as many turrets as the pirates. The turret limit for these premium ships is (Size Class X 2.5 rounded up to the nearest whole number). Ex: Size class 10 ship, instead of a turret limit of 20, it gets 25. Size class 13, it gets 33 turrets - 13 X 2.5 = 32.5 - rounded up = 33.

HOWEVER, if the Military/Police catch the ship in open space, and are not at war, they can stop you and search your vessel. Your vessel must be registered with the Military Police, and it must contain a license signed by the Shipwright in the form of an LCD screen that is displayed on the interior of the ship. This screen will be placed by the Shipwright, signed by him, and locked, so that it cannot be altered. If the ship is not registered, or does not have a license, or both, it is subject to the same impoundment rules as above for the Pirates.

Nomads - The nomads live in space and have to essentially be constantly on the move. Such is the life of a nomad. However, the Nomads can now build huge City-Cvs. These CVs are massive - Size 10 and above, and have the same turret limits/permissions as bases. They are, after all, meant to be mobile bases. However, the drawback is, the ship is not allowed to move more than 8 m/s in any direction. So on the stats page every arrow for every direction has to be 8 m/s or less. The idea is they would want to have 1 or 2 military vessels flying cover for the base CV. While it will not affect the max speed in space it will affect the acceleration of the ship. Otherwise, their limits for ships, military and non-military, run the same as the vanilla rules, just like the Military/Police.

Freelancers - Admittedly I have few ideas for this faction. From what I understand theyre more of the building/less pvp facction. Originally I was toying with the idea for them to have at max 1 or 2 military ships, but get price reductions at the shipwright, but I'm not sure how that would balance. It would mean the Military/Police would likely get more action, but doesn't seem all that fair to the Freelancers.

Let me know what you think or if you have better/alternative ideas!